How reliable are the Tasmota'ed Sonoffs in the long run? (Share your experience and/or configuration please)

krash · January 18, 2019, 11:13am

Can you point me to a how-to? Or some pictures of yours? I’ve studied a little and it seems that the antenna should not be too short or too long, plus i managed to kill one of my sonoffs while trying to solder an antenna to it ( I really dont know how i managed to do that … )

Not really, those that are working well i try not to mess with them
The ones that are giving me trouble i update them but nothing seems to fix it, i probably need to reflash them and ill be sure to avoid 6.4.1 as per:

and

The main issue remains that they are placed inside light fixtures on the ceiling so…

It’s a weekend project to reflash them all

BTW, you guys using tasmota and mqtt right?
Has anyone tried this new component that can control sonoffs without tasmota reflash?
It seems to work well if you just need the basic functionality and no extra sensors on them.

DavidFW1960 · January 18, 2019, 11:20am

Tasmota for me. You can’t go back so far as I know.

tedsluis · January 18, 2019, 11:42am

I am quite unexpected with Sonoff. I have a couple of Sonoff Basic, S26, Pow 2 devices and an RF bridge device running since a few weeks.

I flashed from 6.4.1 sonoff-basic to sonoff-basic to sonoff using OTA. That went smoothly.

I notice no problems while using the sonoff devices.

The wifi signal is between 45% and 70%. How can I find out if they ever disconnect?

tom_l · January 18, 2019, 12:06pm

The switches will show as unavailable in HA. Look at the switch history.

Yep.

6.2.1 downgrade OTA works well.

krash · January 18, 2019, 2:48pm

Will check it out and report back, thanks!

tedsluis · January 19, 2019, 10:28am

Now I understand what you mean. All my Sonoff devices show frequently disconnects and some disconnects are quite long:

I found this link: GitHub - arendst/Tasmota: Alternative firmware for ESP8266 and ESP32 based devices with easy configuration using webUI, OTA updates, automation using timers or rules, expandability and entirely local control over MQTT, HTTP, Serial or KNX. Full documentation at

If I understand it well there are wifi disconnect issues with all 6.4.x based on the 2.4.x core. It is recommended to try with Core 2.3.0 or dev build with beta core 2.5.0

The sonoff-tasmota firmware based on based on the 2.5.0-beta2 core is released here: http://thehackbox.org/tasmota/020500/

If I understand it well, this should be done using the serial connection. Or can I update using an over the air update as well?

Did anyone try this?

tom_l · January 19, 2019, 10:36am

No you cant use OTA to do this.

You have to connect by serial, use the esp flash tool to erase the flash then try flashing tasmota 6.4.1.

OR (if like for me that is too much hassle):

Simply OTA downgrade to 6.2.1.

DavidFW1960 · January 19, 2019, 11:21am

No you can update OTA. You can do a Reset 0 and an OTA update. I still get some disconnects… maybe a short one every few hours.

tom_l · January 19, 2019, 11:33am

You probably can but that is not what is recommended:

For anyone having wifi problems, please try:

Erase all flash using esptool.py or esptool.exe and flash again by wire (as explained here) using the latest precompiled bins from http://thehackbox.org/tasmota/.

klogg · January 19, 2019, 12:42pm

@DavidFW1960, @tom_l

Is there any reason why none of you use version 6.3.0?

tedsluis · January 19, 2019, 12:44pm

@tom_l and @DavidFW1960: thnx for your feedback.

I have updated one of my Sonoff basic devices using an OTA update to the latest Sonoff-Tasmota firmware based on the 2.5.0-beta2 core:

Sonoff Basic Module
Program Version	6.4.1.9(b5824fc-sonoff)
Build Date & Time	2019-01-18T12:13:06
Core/SDK Version	2_5_0_BETA2/3.0.0-dev(c0f7b44)
Uptime	0T00:00:34
Flash write Count	44 at 0xF7000

It works well. I will see whether it improves the WIFI connection.

It is unclear to me whether erasing all flash is necessary in my case, since I have no boot or instability issues. Can anyone explain that?

I will re-flash one of my other Sonoff Basic devices using a serial update to the latest Sonoff-Tasmota firmware based on the 2.5.0-beta2 core. I am curious whether I will notice any difference. I will let you know the results.

tom_l · January 19, 2019, 12:54pm

I had the same problem with this FW as I do with 6.4.1. Intermittent loss of connection and outright loss of connection to some Gen 1 (sonoff basic) devices.

You do not need to erase / reflash. That procedure is only for people encountering connection issues.

DavidFW1960 · January 19, 2019, 11:03pm

Doing the reset and OTA flash was listed as a supported way to fix in the Wiki originally… It certainly worked ok for me. A lot of people have issues with having to get devices out of nasty places and using a wire to reflash is not practical (or necessary)

DavidFW1960 · January 19, 2019, 11:04pm

There are issues with Fritzbox and mesh networks with 2.3.0 core and 6.3 firmware.

klogg · January 19, 2019, 11:30pm

I’m sorry but I’m having trouble following this thread

I have one sonoff on 6.4.1 one on 6.3 (all the rest are on 6.2.1)
Can I downgrade these two OTA to 6.2.1 or not?

If not is it possible to downgrade using a wire and keep all current settings?
I have only ever flashed from factory, or done an OTA upgrade (using minimal first)

reef-actor · January 19, 2019, 11:46pm

This is essentially the modification I did, using some low cost high-ish gain wifi antenna that is designed for 2.4Ghz

clyra · January 19, 2019, 11:46pm

Maybe I’m luck because I have about 5 sonoffs basic still running 5.14.0 and I didnt bothered to upgrade as it just work :-). There’s one that used to disconnect but the wifi signal on that area was weak and the sonoff is inside a fixture. Problem solved when I upgraded my home wifi with a pair of unifi.

tom_l · January 20, 2019, 12:16am

Yes you can. If you need to. If they aren’t having disconnection problems there is no point.

DavidFW1960 · January 20, 2019, 1:27am

Agree with Tom.
I am using a Fritz mesh which is the main reason I wanted to use arduino core 2.5.0. I only fairly recently implemented the mesh as I was previously using a repeater on a different SSID. I had an issue with one sonoff connected to the mesh repeater with it not connecting to WiFi for hours during the night and just flashing in my bedroom till I turned it off. Turned it on the next morning and it started flashing again until I connected to the wifi in the sonoff on my phone and it abruptly connected to the mesh again immediately. I just can’t remember what version of core I was using then. I think this is why I have been compiling new tasmota all the time since 6.4.x trying to find stability again. I get maybe 4 or 5 disconnections from the broker for less than a second every day so it has not caused any error in the performance yet.

As it happens I flashed with a wire for the first time a new SOnoff SV yesterday with the same firmware I put on my other SOnoffs and it is doing exactly the same behaviour so it’s not a flashing OTA issue that I can see.

tedsluis · January 22, 2019, 7:52pm

Last Sunday I prepared 3 exactly the same Sonoff Basic devices with 3 different Sonoff-Tasmota firmwares, see below for the details. Today I see a big difference between the firmware based on the new 2.5.0/3.0.0 dev core and the current firmware based on the 2.4.2/2.2.1 core, in favor of the newest firmware.

Although all firmware’s show disconnections in the HA history, the 6.4.1 with the 2.4.2 core/2.2.1 SDK shows over a ten times more disconnections.

During the measurement (24 hours) the 3 Sonoff basic devices were placed next to each other less than 4 meters away from the WIFI access point.

Fresh installed with 6.4.1.9/3.0.0 dev core using serial after erasing flash

Erased flash using:

[esptool-2.6]$ esptool.py --port /dev/ttyUSB0 erase_flash
esptool.py v2.6
Serial port /dev/ttyUSB0
Connecting....
Detecting chip type... ESP8266
Chip is ESP8285
Features: WiFi, Embedded Flash
MAC: dc:4f:22:d3:63:14
Uploading stub...
Running stub...
Stub running...
Erasing flash (this may take a while)...
Chip erase completed successfully in 4.3s
Hard resetting via RTS pin...

And then installed 6.4.1.9 using serial:
(builded myself from latest development source using VSCODE + PlatformIO plugin on Fedora Linux)

Sonoff Basic Module
basic1
Program Version	6.4.1.9(sonoff)
Build Date & Time	2019-01-20T16:23:56
Core/SDK Version	STAGE/3.0.0-dev(c0f7b44)
Uptime	2T01:17:00
Flash write Count	12 at 0xF8000

21 disconnects:

Upgrade from 6.4.1 to 6.4.1.9 using OTA

Sonoff Basic Module
basic2
Program Version	6.4.1.9(b5824fc-sonoff)
Build Date & Time	2019-01-18T12:13:06
Core/SDK Version	2_5_0_BETA2/3.0.0-dev(c0f7b44)
Uptime	2T1:30:09
Flash write Count	8 at 0xFB000

17 disconnects:

Fresh installed with 6.4.1 using serial connection

(builded myself from the 6.4.1 release, using VSCODE + PlatformIO plugin on Fedora Linux)

Sonoff Basic Module
basic3
Program Version	6.4.1(sonoff)
Build Date & Time	2018-12-24T14:41:00
Core/SDK Version	2_4_2/2.2.1(cfd48f3)
Uptime	2T02:11:24
Flash write Count	43 at 0xF9000

Over 200 disconnects (very hard to see, so zoom in):

I found this difference in disconnects quite remarkable. Has any one tested this too?

Sorry, but I did not test with the older firmware’s.

my conclusion

the newest dev firmware work much better than the current 6.4.1 release with the 2.4.2core and 2.2.1 SDK.